Abstract: We can expect a broad definition of discourse. The last decades have seen a great increase in focusing on literary
discourse and consequently its socio-cultural dimensions. Meanwhile, in translation studies field, very few studies (Troque,
2015) considered the translator as a socio-cultural mediator involved in translation procedure and the way he/she is affecting
the aesthetic-affective charge of the literary discourse. So, this paper discussed the socio-cultural features as factors
underlying almost all literary texts and explored their translation; both limitations and potentials and how these elements
influence the reception of the readers, aesthetically and emotionally. To this end, some parts of a poem by Sohrab Sepehri
(1928-1980), cotemporary Iranian poet, along with its English and French translations were comparatively verified. The
results were presented through tensive model (Fontanille & Zilberberg, 1998) a device used in post-Greimasian semiotics.
The semiotic approach to socio-cultural features of literary discourse and translation delivers valuable results in terms of
assessment of translation and translator training.
Index Terms- Literary translation; socio-cultural features, affective load, aesthetics, translation assessment, Sohrab Sepehri.